Dec. 12, 1939. H.R. HAASE, 2,182,804 ‘VENETIAN BLIND Filled Deo. 2, 1938Patented Dec. 12, 1939 UNITED STATES 2,182,804 PATENT OFFICE Harold R. Haase, River Forest, 1. Application December 2, 1938, Serial No. 248,511 12 Claims, In the modern era of windows without drapertes, ‘or with draperies at the sides of the windows only, ‘Venetian blinds in which the operating mecha~ nism of the blind is completely hidden in the '5 head structure thereot have become very popular in order to provide a neat appearance for the exposed blind. In such a blind it ts desirable to hhave the head structure reasonably low in its over-all height for the sake of neatness. A head 20 structure, the helght of which is no greater than ‘the width of the slats of the blind, 1s generally considered satisfactory from the standpoint of artistic proportioning, although in some instances it may be desirable to have a head structure a8 1 low as possible while in other instances it may be entirely satisfactory for the head structure to be slightly higher. There have been various sug~ ‘estiona for constructions which would permit the ‘se of a low head structure or control head, some 2 of which have been. very satlsfactory although rather expensive to manufacture. Among the desirable characteristics of such @ control head are: adequate strength, dependability and ease of operation, and low cost. 26 Prior to a recent invention of mine, the control, heads of low height have usually used a metallic ‘housing tn order to make use of both the strength of the thin walls of the housing for support and the relatively great space within these thin walls, 9 According to the recent invention mentioned, however, the tilt mechanism was so compressed that it could be applied over @ wooden head all of the conventional general configuration without unduly enlarging the over-all helght of ‘95 the control head. One object of the present invention is to pro- vide additional and preferably simpler means for utCizing the principles of sald recent invention in providing a very compact tilt mechanism sult- 40 able for use over a wooden head rail if desired. Another object of the invention is to provide a ow control head construction which operates d- rectly on the tilt tapes so that no separate pieces need be secured to the tilt tape. 45 _ In the preferred forms of the present invention the front tit tape extends through the tilt tape ‘manipulating mechanism within the head struc- ture and down therefrom to be secured to the rear tilt tape, the manipulating structure being ‘50 #0 constructed as to manipulate the tilt tapes ‘without any slippage and without any objection- bie creepage. Tt should be understood that a ‘reepage of the tape with respect to the manipu- lating mechanism would be very undesirable in ‘ps that 1t might result in twisting the slats or in (CL 15817) having the manipulating structure reach the end of ty movement before the blind slats were fully ‘Additional objects and advantages will become evident from the following deseription and from 6 ‘the drawing, in which: Fig. 1 1s a fragmentary front elevation of a blind ‘embodying this invention with the cover {or the control head removed. ‘Fig. 2 1s a fragmentary vertical sectional view 10 taken substantially on the line 22 of Fig. 1. ig. 3 1s a fragmentary longitudinal sectional ew jaken approximately on the line #4 of 6. 2. Fig. 4 is a fragmentary vertical sectional view 16 taken approximately on the line (4 of Fig. 1. Figs. 5, 6 and 7 are views corresponding to Fig. 2 but showing modified forms of the invention. Fig. 5A is a fragmentary plan view of the form shown in Fig. 5. 0 Although this invention may take numerous forms, only a few have been chosen for ilustra~ Hon. "In all of them the blind has been Mustrated ‘as including a plurality of slats 11 normally held in spaced-apart relationship by Indder tapes 12 95 ‘but adapted to be drawn together from the bot tom upwardly by raising cords {3 extending around pulleys 14 and 18 to hang down from ‘the control head as seen best at 18. Any sultable cord lock, indleated diagrammatically at 11, may 39 be provided for holding the slats ralsed to any desired height. It will be understood that the raising cords (3 extend freely through the slats 11 and are secured to bottom rail 18 so that the cords raise the bottom rail 18 and pick UD 35 ‘the s'ats in turn as it reaches them. ‘According to the well known practice in Ve- netian blinds, the ladder tapes 12 or any substl- tutes therefor are so mounted that they may be ‘manipulated by raising one side of each ladder 49 tape while lowering the other side so that the slats may be tilted to any desired angle. ‘Thus, as seen in full lines in Fig. 2, the slats are in horizontal position, while, as seen in dotted lines in the same gure, one side of the tilt tape has 4s been raised and the other lowered to shift the slats toa steeply inclined position, thus in effect closing the blind. According to the present invention the ‘manipulating means may assume any one of vari- ous forms, In all of the forms chosen for illus go tration, the manipulating means includes a con- trol ro'ler 21 which manipulates the tilt tape by {frictional engagement therewith, the tit tape ex- ‘tending partially around the control roller. In some of the forms the control roller is identified gg10 20 30 “ w 2 by the refererice 21a or 218 for the sake of clarity in discussing the different forms. ‘One of the forms of the invention Is shown in wigs. 1 to 3. In this form the control roller 21 fs rotatably carried by a bracket 22 of generally U-shape which is secured on top of a head rail 24, ‘The use of the head rail 28 as the support ‘means is often preferred because of the fact that this is stock plece of lumber which can be readily secured by any small Venetian blind manufacturer and can easily be fitted to the blind. According to the form of the invention of Pigs, 1 to 3, a pair of relatively narrow and somewhat tapered slots 24 are cut through the hhead rail 23 at each tlt tape position for the two sides of the tilt tape to pass through. Of course, the raising cord pulleys 14 will be mounted at the same points in the usual way so that the raising cord 13 extending down through the slats Will be hidden by the tilt tapes 12, The roller 21 is preferably formed of a metallic cyl~ Inder 21 which may conveniently be die cast and preferably has an externally ribbed rubber sleeve 28 cemented or otherwise secured thereto. ‘The extended portion 28 of the ladder tape extends ‘over and thus partially around the roller 21 and fs secured to the other side of the ladder tape as seen at 31, ‘The position of the joint 31 is such that it will not interfere with the movement of the tape over the roller 2{ or be noticeable from the front of the blind. ‘The tape extension 289 is squeezed against the rubber sleeve 28 of the roller 21 by pressure roller 32 which may be urged toward the roller 2/ in any suitable man- ner, “The rollers 21 and $2 may be driven by any de- sirable drive mechanism and are preferably geared together, at least unless the larger or con- trol roller 21 is driven directly. In the illus- trated form of Figs. 1'to 3 the two rollers are geared together by means of gear teeth 38 which may be formed on the respective rollers in die fasting. ‘The smaller or pressure roller $2, which is preferably ribbed, is driven by a shaft 436 to which it is keyed as by a suitable pin 37. ‘The shaft 36 in turn passes through the pressure roller 32 at all other tape positions and through f@ control cord unit 38 in which a pulley 39 Is Keyed to the shaft $8, The control cord unit 38 fs seen best in Figs. 1 and 4, in which it is seen that a contro! cord 41 is wrapped around the pulley $8 several revolutions and preferably se~ cured thereto @t an appropriate mid-point so that the pulley 49 and the shaft 38 may be ro- tated in either direction by pulling the different strands of the control cord 41. Control cord 4 preferably passes over a guide pulley 42 which hhas been illustrated as elongated so that the con trol cord may move back and forth as it is wound on of unwound from the pulley 38. ‘The control cord 41 passes downwardly through a slot 43 in the front side of the head rail 23. ‘The shaft 96 furnishes a convenient means for applying pressure on the pressure rollers 32 to- ‘ward the control roller 21. ‘This may be accom- plished by the simple expedient of running the Shaft 46 through slots 44 in bracket 22, hocking fone end of a spring 46 around the shaft $6 and hooking the other end to a suitable lug 41 which. may be bent out from the bracket 22. One spring 48 may be provided at each end of each of the pressure rollers 32. ‘The shaft 36 will be long enough so that its angular deflection due to its lateral movement Will be negligible and hence it, isnot necessary to take special precautions to keep 2,182,804 the rollers $2 in parallelism, and one spring by each roller could be omitted. ‘Tt will be evident that as one end of the control cord 41 is pulled it will unwind trom pulley 28, thus rotating the pulley 39 and the shaft 36 which in turn will rotate the pressure rollers 92, and these will rotate the control rollers 21° to which they are geared. Because of the relatively small slze of the pressure voller 32 as compared to the control rouler 21, this arrangement has the ef- fect of a gear reduction arrangement so that ‘worm gear drive between the cord 41 and the shaft 36 will not be necessary. Of course, such ‘worm gear drive may be provided in accordance with conventional practice if preferred, one form of such drive being illustrated in my copending ‘application Serial No. 211,190, May 31, 1938, ‘The entire operating mechanism of the control hhead may be concealed behind a face board 51 which may conveniently be made of ordinary Venetian blind slat stock, This face board may be secured in any suitable manner as by clips 82. In Pig. 5 I have illustrated a similar type of {iit contro! mechanism mounted in a sheet metal casing $6. The use of the metal casing permits f@ reduction in the over-all height of the control hhead since a considerable portion of the height of the control head in Fig. 2 is necessary in order to make room for a head rail 23 of sufficient thickness to provide the necessary strength. ‘The form of the invention illustrated in Pig. 5 is also slightly different from that in Fig. 2 in that a ‘second pressure roller 32a has been provided to ‘make doubly certain that there will be no slippage between the control roller 21 and the tape exten- slon 28. ‘The pressure roller 82a is geared to the control rolier 24 and may be provided with stub shafts 87 af its ends, to each of which a spring ‘will be applied. As a matter of fact, it, will be ‘most convenient to suspend one spring between each of the stub shafts 51 and the nearest por- tlons of the shaft 36. The stub shafts 67 may bbe provided with a cap or an annular groove for retaining the spring thereon as seen in Fig. 5A. Tt should be understood that in Fig. 5 the vari ous parts of the tilt mechanism and preferably also the ralsing pulley 14 may be secured to a bracket §8 carried within the metallic housing 56, which is preferably of channel shape as seen in Fig. 5. ‘Still another form of the invention has been shown in Fig. 6, in which the head rail 23 has slots 61 cut in the front and back faces thereof for the tapes 12. With this form of the invention the pressure roliers 92 and 82a also serve as guide rollers to support the tape extension 29 approxi- mately directly over the slots 61 and at the same time cause it to pass partially around the con- trol roller 21, ‘The shafts for rollers 32 and 32a are mounted in sloping slots so that they are urged toward control roller 24a by the weight of the slats, Springs may also be used. Fig. 6 also Mlustrates a modification of the driving arrange- ments in that it shows a shaft 63 extending through the control roller 21a to drive this roller Girectly instead of through the pressure roller 432, Of course, the shaft 62 will be driven with the usual worm gear drive by a control cord 4 ‘This alternative driving arrangement may be Used in all of the forms of the invention. In Fig. 7 still another modification of the in- vention has been shown. According to this form 8 control unit is provided for mounting on the hhead rail 28, which need not be slotted for the tit tapes. Tt should be understood that there is 10 rT 20 3 o